Google's Birthday and One flashy Interview After Another...

Yesterday we got to celebrate our first group birthday! Conner (a.k.a. Google, the Goog, Magic Man, or Magic G as he will be referred to henceforth as he seems to know just about everything. On the bus ride to our excursion (which will be explained later) alone I learned the four different meanings of the word fine as defined in the dictionary, the ingredients and preparations necessary to bake a Red Velvet Chocolate Cake, and the correct use of the word henceforth. Not to mention he has flawless navigation skills and is good at fixing the computer.) We all chipped in and got him a cake from a bakery relatively close to our apartment, got the waitress to light the candles, we all sang Happy Birthday, and then made him give a toast.  Our group as a whole is big on toasts, birthdays or not.

Before all the birthday and excursion festivities, Thomas and I went with Lana to her interview.  Not to say that we actually sat in on her interview (just being clear because according to our program managers they have had several problems with interns doing this) but her potential job is at one of the biggest, most internationally acclaimed, malls in Ireland.  It has 29 restaurants and is over a mile long.  Though I'm incredibly excited for my marketing director intern of a roommate to keep me updated on all the greatest sales, it took us over an hour and half to get there by bus and then the Luas (which is apparently Irish for "very slow train") and Lana has to be there from 9 - 5 and is expected to work some weekends so I'm guessing she's not quite as thrilled.  I've already started to teach her the Dolly Parton song...

After we headed back to City Center to get the International Student IDs from the "use it station" to help us get our International student travel cards, to help us catch a break on paying for public transport to and from work everyday.  Keeping in mind that 5 of the people from our program had gotten these cards on Wednesday and 1 had gotten it a couple hours before we showed up WITH THE SAME INFORMATION WE HAD, we thought it would be a breeze. However it seems that in a couple hours time span one of us had greatly disgraced the country while using his EUSA student IDs (the ones we received with the program that said STUDENT at the top right above UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI) and it was no longer a valid source of proof that we were indeed international students and not bums or terrorists. The international insurance card we provided stating our program dates by permission of our university, our Ole Miss student IDs, our licenses and passports were not credible either.  Turns out the requirements had changed that afternoon and they now needed proof of tuition, signed university letterhead verifying our enrollment, and our firstborn children to be considered actual students. Inexplicably, we had brought none of these things along.

Last night the program sponsored an "excursion" which included a free 3 course dinner and a folklore reading at the oldest pub in Dublin, The Boar's Head (which according to Goog was founded in 1190). The stories were really fun and I finally got to try real Irish Stew.

I had my interview this afternoon along with my friend Melanie who will hopefully be working with me. I say hopefully because at the end of what I considered a great interview, the interviewers said they would inform EUSA of their decision and the program would be in touch soon. I'm pretty sure I had all the right skills but more importantly I'd be working for free so in all reality my skills, even my personality, shouldn't really matter that much.  You know it's a bad economy when people won't even hire free workers. We had originally intended to follow the mapped directions given to us by the program, which indicated 2 buses and a 20 minute walk (in heels), but thought better of it when we were informed that we could take a 20 minute bus ride that would drop of us directly in front of the hotel where we were interviewing. During this bus ride, and luckily not during my interview, I found out that the buttons on my nice suit shirt come unbuttoned very easily and it's hard to notice the difference until a good breeze really hits you.

 

After the interview we went to where they produced the travel cards (Trinity University Student Union).  I filled out all the paperwork, and gave the guy his money. I barely flashed him my EUSA ID and he finally printed me out an official student travel ID card that will get me discounts on all plane and bus tickets without even asking me if I had international official ID. You've gotta love college workers. 

Until next time...E